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Catamount Day One

Well, another weekend and another cyclocross race is in the legs and soul. Today was a fine day of racing and hanging out with good people. I’ve always liked racing at Catamount and today was no exception.

As usual there was a lot of climbing and lots of big wide fast corners – a good combination that requires lungs, determination, and some cornering skills. There were also the requisite big rocks to dodge and trees on courses, but this just adds to the spicyness of the day!

Got in a couple of early warm-up laps and then I cheered on Marc (thanks to Karl for doing the pits). Marc gad a solid race and was in a big chase group for most of the race. With a good ride Marc finished in 9th. Then his second race of the day started – helping me out with pre-race prep.

After a good warm-up and some positive talk from Marc I was ready to go. I managed to make myself a tad nervous but after chatting with a few people on the short ride to the start line I was okayish. Good roster of racers on the line and before I knew it, we were off! My start was sluggish and I spent the bulk of the first lap and a half catching and passing people. I managed to settle into a good rhythm and focused on the next person in front of me. In the end I got outsprinted at the line and finished 8th. I had caught and passed my competitor in the last 200 meters or so but didn’t have the gas to hold on.

Many thanks to the young guns for their cheering, to Marc for all his work, cheering and kind words. Big thanks to my parents for the cheers and photos!

A very big thank-you to Sophie for her very kind words after the race. It really was so nice.

Really good to connect with lots of friends again. Excellent day. A good ride but still lots of things that need improvement and refinement. The best thing about today was that I felt like a bike racer again. I raced calmly, didn’t panic, took some risks, kept on digging and really left it out there. In contrast to last week when I hated doing 5 laps – this week I wanted another one so I could keep on pushing things. So today was good but there are many lessons from the day and I feel lucky to be able to get out again and do it again.

Thanks for the emails, comments, Facebook posts and Tweets – these really do have an impact.